Adjustable door hinge



May 8, 1956 J. P. MCMILLAN 2,744,284

ADJUSTABLE DooR HINGE Filed April 12. 1952 JUDSON P. MC MILLAN,

INVENTOR.

Unit States Patet ADJUSTABLE DQR HINGE I Judson Pg'McMillan, Los Angeles, Calif. f Application April 12, 1952, Serial No. 232,045 y 3 claims. (ci. 16A-131) Y vThis invention relates to hinges for swinging closures,

with special reference to adjustable hinges, and is specifically directed to an adjustable hinge for mounting a door in-building construction. The purpose of hinges of this general type' is to permit adjustment of a door relative to 'a'door jamb'after the door is mounted on the jamb.

It is well known that need for such adjustment of the door on its hinges may arise from sagging, warping, swelling and shrinking on the part of either the door structure or the Ijambstructure `and in such instances the needy may occura long time after the door is mounted on its hinges. More important, however, is the need for adjustability at the-,time of hanging the door to compensate for small variations among door hinges and for inaccuracies in the cutting of mortise seats in doors and jambs. Even with the exercise of great-care and skill, doors often fail to hang right the iirst time they are mounted on their hinge.

i Thev usual remedial procedure followed at the time of hanging Va door is the insertion of shims behind the hinges but such a measure to correct the misalignment of a door is expensive'becausedoors are hung by skilled craftsmen at high hourly rates. `It can be appreciated, therefore, that substantial savings in the cost of installing doors can be obtained by using hinges that can be quickly and simply adjusted to vary the position of the door relav tive to the door jamb on which it is mounted.

Although adjustable hinges have been suggested heretofore in the art, none have found wide acceptance and, notwithstanding ythe well recognized need for adjustability, such hinges are rarely used in conventional building construction today; The one disadvantage that usuallyv prevents wide adoption of adjustable hinges is that the hinge requires departure from the standard procedure for hanging a door. In some instances the adjustable hinge requires a mortise seat of unusual-,dimension and conguration. In other instances special base plates or ,the like are used for the hinges and often special instructions are required to make craftsmen familiar with an adjustable hinge and .its mode of installation.

v The present invention avoids these disadvantages by providing what is, in effect-a standard butt hinge, the

hinge being standard or conventional not only in dirnensions and conliguration, but also in the disposition of the usual countersunk holes to receive wood screws for installing the hinge. Thus a workman needs no special instructions to install the hinge. He proceeds to attach the leaves of the butt hinge inthe usual manner to the usual mortise seats in the door and in the corresponding door jamb. Moreover, the present adjustable hinge is a self-contained hinge structure with no separate plates or other parts to be lost or misplaced in they handling and transporting of the hinge.

Broadly described, the new hinge comprises theusual pair of pivotally interconnected-leaves, at least one of which leaves has an outer face to lie against a mounting surface such as a mortise seat when the hinge is installed for use. This leaf has the usual holes to receive wood screws for attachment to the mounting surface and has vPatented May L8, 1956 'at'. least/.one additional hole ythat is tapped to receive a screw. lAdjustably mounted inthe one or more threaded holes iswhatmay be termed a spacer screw for adjustlment'towards vthe mounting surface.- The outer end of thelspacergscfrew is enlarged-to provide a relatively eX- e, tensivearea vfor pressure contact against the mounting surface, thus minimizingv any tendency of the spacer screw to penetrate or deforrnthe mounting surface. Preferably the-leaf isvprovided with, two such spacer screws to permit the vleaf to be tilted relative ,to the mounting ysurface as well as to permitl the leaf to berspaced outward 'from the vby; loosening the .wood screws then advancing the spacer screws toward the support surface, each to the degree v desired, and finally tightening the wood screws to cooperate with the spacer screws to hold the hinge leaf in thedesired, new alignment. j

In the preferred practice of the invention the spacer screws in the? one hinge leaf have relatively small Shanks andVv the other leaf of the butt hinge has recesses or apertures to clear the inner ends of the spacer screws when the twogleaves are folded together. While only one of the two :leavesmay: be provided with such spacer screws, a feature ofthe preferred practice of the invention is the use of spacer screws in both leaves of the butt hinge, each hingebeing recessed or apertured to clear the inner ends of the spacerscrewscarried yby the other leaf.

A furtherspecial feature of the preferred embodiment of the invention is the provision of recesses around the outer end of each threaded hole lto provide a seat into which the enlarged end of the corresponding spacer screw may be retracted to make the outer end face of the-spacer screw. substantially ilush with the router face of the hinge leaf. By providing such recesses or seats and by employing spacer screws that are not longer than the combined thickness ofthe two leaves when the two leaves are folded together, I1 provide a butthinge of standard dimensions and coniiguration `in which the' retracted spacer screws lie entirely within the `standard dimensions and configuration.

- The invention maybe more fully appreciated from the following detailed description considered with the accompanying drawings.y

In the drawings, which illustrative, 'l j g f Figure l is a perspective view of the presently preferred embodiment of the invention as a buttv hinge for mountarle to be regarded as merely ying a dooron av door jamb.

Figure 2 is a sectional view of the hinge in folded posi-v tion as mounted on a door and door jamb,.the section' being taken as indicated by the broken line 2--2 of Figure i l;and l i Figure 3 is a vertical section taken as indicated by the line 3-3 of Figure 2. p

. The butt hinge shown in the drawing is of the usual construction comprising two leaves l0 and 11. In the usual-manner, leaves 1t) and 11 are formed with interlitting cylindrical knuckles 12 and 13, respectively, which enclose the usual pintle 15 by which the two leaves are pivotally interconnected. -In thernormal use of the hingejamb 25 with the outer face 26 of the leaf lying adjacent the bottom surface of the mortise seat, the hinge leaf being secured to the door jamb by wood screws 21 extending through screw holes 20. In like manner the second leaf 11 is mounted by similar wood screws in a mortise seat 27 in a door 2S, with the outer face 29 of the leaf facing the bottom surface of the mortise seat. Thus the inner surfaces of two mortise seats 24 and 27 provide the mounting surfaces for the butt'hinge. It will be noted that the screw holes 20 of each leaf are staggered, two of these screw holes being offset from the other two screw holes. If only three screw holes are provided instead of four, one of the three will be offset in this manner relative to the other two. Y

In accord with the teachings of the invention, each of the two leaves and 11 is provided with the pair of spacer-screws 33, each spacer-screw being mounted in a tapped or threaded hole 31 for adjustment towards a corresponding support surface of a mortise seat. Preferably each spacer screw 30 is formed with a circular enlargement 35 at its outer end and is formed with a diametrical kerf at its inner end to receive a screw-driver for rotational adjustment of the spacer screw.

As heretofore indicated, preferably each of the two eaves 1i) and 11 is recessed on its outer face around each of the threaded holes 31 to provide a seat 37 into which the enlargement 35 of the spacer screw may be withdrawn. It is contemplated that the seat 37 will be of substantially the same depth as the enlargement 35 of the spacer screw so that the outer face of the enlargement may be retracted to a position substantially flush with the outer face of the hinge leaf.

Since the inner end of a spacer screw 30 protrudes from the inner face of the leaf in which the spacer screw is mounted, especially when the spacer screw is in its retracted position, the other leaf is suitably recessed or apertured to provide clearance in this region. Thus each of the two leaves 10 and 11 is provided with two small apertures 3S to clear the inner'ends of the spacer screws 30 mounted in the other of the two leaves when the two leaves are folded together as shown in Figures 2 and 3. It will be further noted in the present embodiment that the overall length of the spacer screws 30 is less than the total thickness of the butt hinge in the folded position of the butt hinge so that the spacer screws in their fully retracted positions lie entirely within the configuration of the folded hinge.

The manner in which the described adjustable butt hinge is used may be readily understood from the foregoing description. It is contemplated that the spacer screws 39 will be normally in fully retracted positions with the enlargements 35 of the spacer screws withdrawn into the corresponding seats 37 to avoid interference with the normal procedure of attaching the hinge leaves to the supporting surfaces in the mortise seats in the door and door jamb. It is apparent that for the purpose of installation the adjustable hinge may be regarded by the craftsman as a conventional hinge and will be mounted on the door and door jamb respectively in exactly the same manner as a conventional hinge.

After the door is mounted with the various wood screws 21 tight to hold the hinge leaves firmly against the support surfaces, any change that may be desired in the hang or alignment of the door relative to the door jamb may be acomplished simply by loosening the wood screws and adjusting the spacer screws. For example proper alignment of the door may require that hinge leaf 11 be inclined away from the mounting surface in the mortise seat 27 as shown in Figures 2 and 3. The desired inclination is accomplished by loosening the wood screws 21 that anchor the leaf 11 in the mortise seat 27 and then rotating the two spacer screws 30 for adjustment of the end enlargements 35 towards the mortise seat. In this instance, the upper spacer screw 30 is advanced towards the support surface somewhat more than the lower spacer screw 30 in accord with the desired inclination of the hinge leaf relative to the mortise seat. After the two spacer screws 30 are adjusted to the positions indicated in `Figure 3, the wood screws 21 are again tightened to cooperate with the spacer screws in holding the hinge leaf 11 rigidly at the desired inclined position.

The tightening of the wood screws 21 causes the spacer screws 3) to exert considerable pressure against the support surface but the end enlargements 35 of the spacer screws provides such expansive areas for contact with the support surfaces that the spacer screws do not penetrate or mar the support surfaces. It will be noted that with respect to vertical alignment the alignment of the spacer screws 30 is relatively close to the alignment of two of the nearest screw holes 20 and that the horizontal distance between the two screws 30 and the nearest vertical row of screw holes 20 is less than the horizontal distance between the two rows of screw holes. Thus the relatively wide horizontal spacing between the two rows of holcs 26 provides a stable base for anchorage of the leaf to olfset any tendency for the spacer screws 30 to create a turning moment to tend to twist the leaf out of the desired alignment. In this regard it may be further noted that the end enlargements 35 of the spacer screws extend laterally very close to the vertical alignment of the nearest row' of wood screws 21 as may be seen in Figure 2,

Obviously other types of hinges may be constructed for adjustment in the saine way and my description in specific detail of the presently preferred embodiment of the invention will suggest to those skilled in the art various changes, substitutions and other departures from my disclosure that properly lie within the scope and spirit of the appended claims.

I claim:

1. A hinge for swinging closures comprising: two piv otally interconnected leaves, at least one of said leaves having an outer face to lie against a mounting surface when the hinge is installed for use, said leaf having holes to receive screws for attachment of the leaf to said surface and also having at least one threaded hole; and a spacer screw in said threaded hole for adjustment of the outer end of the screw into pressure Contact with said mounting surface, said screw having an enlargement at said outer end to provide a plane surface to minimize deformation of the mounting surface, said screw being adapted at its inner end for tool-actuated rotational adjustment, said one leaf having a recess on its outer face around said threaded hole to receive said enlargement at a retracted position of said spacer screw. l

2. An adjustable hinge as set forth in claim 1 in which the other of said leaves has a recess to clear the inner end of the retracted spacer screw when the two leaves are folded together.

3. An adjustable hinge as set forth inclaim 2 in which said recess around said threaded hole is deep enough to receive substantiallythe full depth of said enlargement and the overall length of said spacer screw is not greater than the combined thickness dimension of said leaves in their folded positions.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 880,317 Von De Marwitz Feb. 25, 1908 992,617 Varchmin et al. May 16, 1911 1,314,732 Cochran et al. Sept. 2, 1919 15381,()72 Kerstetter 1.3. June 7, 1921 2,330,455 Steckel Sept. 28, 1943 

